High Court serves injunction via Twitter

The High Court has used microblogging service Twitter to serve an injunction
against an anonymous web user who has used the platform to impersonate
someone else.

Twitter is said to be discussing adding video-tweets.Photo: ALAMY

6:38PM BST 01 Oct 2009

The court said that Twitter was the best way of serving the notice against an unknown internet user, after ruling that the offending Twitter account, BlaneysBlarney, impersonated the Donal Blaney, owner of law firm Griffin Law, who has a blog in the same name.

The Twitter account, which is not owned by Mr Blaney, uses the same picture that accompanies his legitimate blog site, which has added to confusion.

The anonymous Twitter user will get a message from the Hight Court advising them of the legal action the next time they log on to their Twitter account.

"Whoever they are, they will be told to stop posting, to remove previous posts and to identify themselves to the High Court via a web link form," Andre Walker, a spokesman for Griffin Law, told Reuters.

Legal experts believe the ruling could have wide-reaching implications for the blogosphere.

"I think this is a landmark decision to issue a writ via Twitter," said Dr Konstantinos Komaitis, a lecturer at Strathclyde University's law faculty. "You are creating a precedent that people will be able to refer to. It only takes one litigant to open the path for others to follow.

"The law tends to be quite cumbersome and slow, so to have a court deliberate on something like Twitter – so hot, so relevant – it shows quite impressive engagement."

Twitter's surge in popularity has lead to a growing problem of fake accounts. Earlier this week, Harry Potter author JK Rowling joined the microblogging service after hearing that other users had opened false accounts under her name. "I thought a brief visit was in order just to prevent any more confusion!" she tweeted.

Twitter has attempted to tackle the problem by introducing a verification system to authenticate tweets, giving the official Twitter accounts of high-profile personalities a "seal of approval" on their account page.

Matthew Richardson, the barrister who successfully lobbied for the injunction, said the ruling sent out a strong message that anonymous abuse of the internet would not be tolerated.

"People have to learn that they can no longer hide behind the cloak of anonymity the internet provides and break the law with impunity," he said.

It is not yet clear what further action will be taken against the Twitter user if they do not respond to the injunction.